tidewaterreview.com

Gifts that'll keep you on the guest list

The first step to becoming everyone's favorite guest is to bring a good present. The second rule is make the present more interesting than something they'll just regift.

Ellen Warren

November 11, 2010

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Some people are just natural hosts. Then there are the rest of us.

We yearn to be invited to somebody else's house for holiday dinners and parties and weekends and pretty much anything. And to be invited back again — and again.

While there's an entire industry out there telling us how to be a good host — hello, Martha Stewart — where's the info about being a good guest?

Right here.

The first step to becoming everyone's favorite guest is to bring a good present (or send one afterward). The second rule is make the present more interesting than a bottle of wine, a handful of flowers or some dopey dust catcher they'll shove in a drawer or re-gift.

Mind you, not everyone agrees with me on this. Anna Post, great-great-granddaughter of etiquette czarina Emily Post (emilypost.com) says a gift is "nice but not required." I say if you want to be sitting at that holiday table next year, bring one. And put some serious thought into it.

Some suggestions: Most people think their pets and kids are pretty special, and deserving of much fawning and attention. So you can't go wrong with presenting a little something for them instead of some lame host or hostess offering. If you're wily, it will be something that will occupy the little darlings' time (a game, coloring or activity book, crayons or colored pencils; a dog toy or treat or a kitty catnip tchotchke).

And you can never have too many interesting picture frames, so choose one and put a picture in there of a previous holiday gathering at your hosts' home — if you have one — and you're sure to get invited again. (And bring your camera to the next dinner, so you'll have the photo ready for the ensuing holiday invite.)

On this page I've assembled some frugal options, all under $25, to get your gift-giving brain cells percolating. The common element that unites the disparate presents is shopping at unique stores or browsing the big box places with a fresh eye and thinking not just about the grownups but the little critters too.

Oh, and send a thank-you note. It's old-fashioned and surprising. That's why it's such a good idea.